Mississippi State director of track and field Al Schmidt collapsed on the infield during the first day of the meet at Spec Towns Track. Schmidt's heart stopped twice, but a crew of athletic trainers, doctors and other first responders - nearly all of whom had SEC ties - revived Schmidt.

"Just being here, at the SEC track meet, saved his life, there's not a doubt in my mind," Dudley said. "You had all these people and all this equipment right here. And they knew what they were doing. If he had been in a restaurant or his hotel, he wouldn't have made it. Let me tell you something, I'm glad we were right here. The best people in the world who could treat him were right here. The SEC meet saved his life."

Schmidt, 60, suffered a heart attack on Thursday. He was transported to the Athens Regional Medical Center and will have bypass surgery on Monday. Dudley said that Schmidt was alert and talking on Thursday night.

"It was pretty tough, everybody had their heads down and everything," said Mississippi State decathlete Tevarus Christian, who along with teammate Antoine Lipscomb had just finished their 400-meter dash heats on Thursday when Schmidt collapsed. "It was scary. At first, we thought we'd lost him. He stopped breathing for about 30 seconds and we thought he was gone. He blanked out twice. Luckily, the ambulance and everybody got here and we were able bring him back. But it was scary, really scary."

Dudley was the first to Schmidt's side when he collapsed. Schmidt has a history of heart problems and was trying to take some medicine when he went down.

"I saw him kind of leaning over and stumbling and I saw the nitroglycerin tablets in his hand," Dudley said. "He went down and I ended up having to try to put the tablets in his mouth. They were all crushed up and none of them were in one piece, so I kind of had to rub it in his mouth and wait for help."

Help arrived quickly. The father of Arkansas decathlete Kevin Lazus is a doctor and helped initiate CPR. Georgia's training staff, including director of sports medicine Ron Courson and assistant David Chandler, arrived with a defibrillator. Mississippi State high jumper and 400 runner James Harris sprinted to the gate nearest Lumpkin Street and opened it so the ambulance could drive directly onto the infield.

"Every single person who was here played a role," Dudley said. "We had people coming out of the stands chanting Al's name and trying to keep him alert. We had trainers running back and forth with every piece of equipment you can imagine and they knew exactly what to do with it. It was an amazing job they did to bring Al back."

Schmidt had been Mississippi State's head coach for 22 years before moving to his current post this season. He recruited most of the current Mississippi State athletes and his health scare put competition into perspective.

"It was really serious," Christian said. "He is very close to all of us. He's like a father for all of us. It was really scary, and it showed us that you can leave the world at any time of any day. Luckily, we were able to pull him through. A light was shining on him and hopefully we'll see him at the track soon."

Christian finished sixth in the Decathlon with 6,900 points and teammate Antoine Lipscomb was ninth with 6,732 points.

Haley Greenwell had the highest finish for Mississippi State on Friday, placing third in the women's 10,000 with a time of 34 minutes, 33.48 seconds.